Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Hello everyone. Looking for info on the following scenario. Any help would be appreciated!!!

We recently found that the Koi in the water dragon pond were suffering from the water quality - too many nitrites. We are draining the pond and setting it up again. It is about 50 gallons of water.

In order to get the pond right we are dechlorinating, adding the neccesarey salts (this is a freshwater pond but some salt is necessary for PH), adding a bacteria fluid and a biomat. Once we get the water set we will move the fish and the CWDs back in.

The root cause of the problem was that the filter I use has a UV light in it and when I added the original bacteria it was instantly killed. Therefore the biomat never established and the fish and CWDs were just bombing the water with ammonia. I SHOULD have been testimng it but was not. I have since bought a kit.

My question is:

Is there any reason that Koi and CWDs cannot share water assuming we test regularly?

THANKS!

Both Koi and water dragons produce a lot of waste. As you already know since you are having trouble keeping up with the waste products. Koi also can carry a lot of diseases which may effect your water dragons. It would probably be easier to have the koi in their own pond, or maybe you should try a big canister filter. You need a filter for a 200 gallon pond or bigger, because water dragons produce much more waste than fish alone do.
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Mom to:

1 little boy born 7/19/04
2 male RES, born 2001
1 ribbon snake, age unknown
3 FBT, ages unknown
1 female bearded dragon, born 5/2002
1 male lab mix, born 5/24/03
1 female calico cat, born 6/7/04

I do have a cannister filter - it has a UV light on it to keep the water clean. In retrospect it was keeping the water too clean - no bacteria at all. The biomat is back under the waterfall for aesthetic purposes and when I checked it looked almost brand new. In other words - I never established the ecosystem.

They looked really cool in there together. It looked great. I would love to make it work for that reason alone.

I think you are right though. The Koi and the dragons together generate a lot of waste. Keeping up with it may be a nightmare. In addition, the Koi will eventually outgrow the pond anyway so I may as well deal with it now.

thanks